1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to an apparatus and method for e-mail polling in a portable terminal, and in particular, to an apparatus and method for performing e-mail polling in a portable terminal by connecting to an e-mail server periodically, in order to inform a user of the arrival of a new e-mail in the portable terminal.
2. Description of the Related Art
The use of portable terminals is becoming widespread with the development of the electronics and communications industries. In order to meet users' demands, portable terminals have been developed to provide a variety of additional functions in addition to basic functions. Examples of the additional functions include a phonebook function, a game function, a scheduler function, a message function, an Internet function, and an e-mail function.
In order to provide an e-mail function to a user, the portable terminal periodically polls new e-mails corresponding to the IDentification (ID) of the user. The e-mail polling includes detecting and receiving a new mail that has arrived at a connected e-mail server.
FIG. 2 is a flowchart illustrating a conventional procedure for connecting to an e-mail server in accordance with an e-mail polling period of a portable terminal.
Referring to FIG. 2, in step 201, a user of a portable terminal sets a periodical e-mail polling mode in the portable terminal. In step 203, the portable terminal drives a timer in an idle state.
In step 205, the portable terminal determines whether a predetermined time period of the timer has expired. If the predetermined time period has expired, the procedure proceeds to step 207; and if the predetermined time period has not expired, step 205 is repeated. In step 207, the portable terminal connects to an e-mail server to perform e-mail polling.
Thereafter, the procedure returns to step 203 to repeat the subsequent steps.
However, because the portable terminal connects to the e-mail server frequently in accordance with the predetermined time period set for polling new e-mails, the conventional e-mail polling method causes a large power consumption.